Liquid Diet

There’s something very appealing about the idea that liquids could “not count” when it comes to reducing one’s caloric intake. The lack of bulk suggests that there is no correlation between what you drink and the physical fat you want to lose.

The juice diet might therefore seem like an easy, and easy to maintain option: don’t chew anything; just slurp away. And you can get all your nutrients if you mix it up with milk, juice, a shake, sodas and a bevvy or two as a reward at the end of the day.

Often, “juicers” take this a step further by simply reducing solid foods into liquids by tossing them in a blender. Sure — you might drink it down, but make no mistake about it: you’re eating, not drinking, or at least your stomach is.

This handy little chart from 1968 means well. It wants to remind the dieter that alcohol has calories too, and does it by providing tasty, fat-laden equivalents to popular drinks. Certainly, it aims to act as a diet fairy sitting on the shoulder of the lady who will whisper in her ear “that Daiquiri is like eating 3 tablespoons of cream cheese!”

But how effective is it, really?

If I want a glass of wine with dinner, I’m not going to be put off by seeing that it’s equivalent to two teaspoons of butter. Whatev. It could also backfire by making one salivate at the thought of snarfing back peanuts or bacon, but knowing these are off-limits, reach for a beer instead.

Of course, it’s not just calories at stake here: it’s fat. There isn’t any in the drinks, but loads in the foods. The fat which will be produced by the body converting all that carbohydrate will come later. This too is the hidden problem with juice diets: they’re loaded with carbs.

Better to eat that avocado with a glass of wine. Because we all know that the peanuts are going to make you want a beer and vice-versa. And that there’s nothing that works as well as taking your mind off your fat than getting drunk.

Salut! 

Eat and Stay Slim, Better Homes and Gardens, 1968

Also from this book: Life's A Bitch

Sloe Gin

With a maturation time of seven years, it ought to be called “slow gin,” which is often what people think the word is. The sloe berry is a lovely blue which when touched turns to black, and was once very prevalent among British hedgerows, along with rosehips and blackberries. Rosehips, full of vitamin C, aren’t good to eat, but make a lovely sweet cordial.

 The sugar is necessary to extract the essence from the berries in the alcohol, which turns a deep red color.

Here is Joe Bonamassa singing his song “Sloe Gin.” It was originally written and performed by Tim Curry. 

The Alice B. Toklas Cook Book, Alice B. Toklas, 1954

Also from this book: One Toke Over The Line

Heeeeeeeere’s To Nothing!

This is a book for a jolly drunk. The kind of drunk who becomes overly jovial and wants to cheer everyone up by challenging them to games designed to make them feel stupid while affirming their own superiority.

It is not a book for cruel drunks, violent drunks, horny drunks, miserable drunks, hostile drunks, black-out drunks, slutty drunks, chug-a-lug drunks, or penniless drunks.

Be warned: today’s drunk might not have many of the props mentioned within. Cufflinks, for example. An American car in the parking lot. A matchbook. Cigarettes.

Ed McMahon’s Barside Companion, Parthenon Productions, Inc., 1969

Booze Cake

— Ed, you know who that was at the nametag table?

— No, who?

— Mrs. Pollard.

— Who?

— Sue Pollard’s mum.

— Good Lord.

— She was a cracker, wasn’t she, Ed?

— She was that.

— I loved that woman. I wanted to marry her. I wanted her to be my mom too.

— That’s not how it works, Steve.

— You know what I mean, don’t tell me you don’t. How old were we?

— 12.

— Right. How old was she?

— Somewhere between 30 and 35 I should reckon.

— But she looked so much younger, didn’t she?

— She looked inebriated, most of the time.

— You’d go round to Sue Pollard’s house to play and she’d offer you a drink. And you’d say thanks, and instead of milk or juice she’d hand you a snifter.

— She didn’t want to drink alone.

— She was handy in the kitchen though — you couldn’t fault her. It wasn’t like she was falling down drunk. She always had something baking.

— She was a functional drunk.

— Like us?

— Like us.

— Remember that birthday party where she served that cake and all the kids fell asleep?

— The booze cake! Oh, man.

— Whatever happened to Sue Pollard?

— She got married, like the rest of us. That Wiecher guy.

— Which Wiecher guy?

— Him, over there. The one with the ridiculous suit.

— If he’s here, how come Sue isn’t?

— Divorced, probably. Like the rest of us.

— I hate these things. Why do we come?

— Don’t know. Maybe meet someone.

— Never gonna happen, my friend.

— I really want that recipe for that booze cake.

— Seriously?

— Absolutely.

— Go for it. Ask her.

The Golfer’s Cookbook, Rose Elder, 1977

Also from this book: What A Load Of Bull, If Henry Kissinger Was Petite, Pretty And Black, Clean The Refrigerator Stew

Tess and Cowslips

Wessex, 1890

“Amid the oozing fatness and warm ferments of the Froom Vale, at a season when the rush of juices could almost be heard below the hiss of fertilization, it was impossible that the most fanciful love should not grow passionate. The ready bosoms existing there were impregnated by their surroundings.” 

— Steady on, old chap. That’s a bit fruity, isn’t it?

— Well, that’s rather the point.

— I’m not sure readers are ready for that sort of thing.

— It’s only a description of the season.

— “Ready bosoms”?

— Certainly.

— Ready for what, pray tell?

— For nature to infuse them with life.

— Wink wink!

— They are ready to be impregnated by their surroundings, not a man. Really, must you always see the worst?

— Look — I’m only pointing out what your publisher inevitably will. What’s the novel about, anyway?

— It’s a tragedy about a maid struggling against the injustices of life. Her name is Tess. 

— And?

— And in order to replace a dead horse she is raped and bears a child who dies and is then married by a man who leaves her when he finds out, and she is opportuned once again by her rapist whose mistress she becomes before her wayward husband returns, whereupon she murders the father of her dead baby, runs off with the returned husband hoping to escape, but is apprehended and hung for her crime.

— Good Lord, man.

— One day it will be a classic of literature, I am sure of it.

— You, Sir, are off your rocker. This isn’t literature; it’s the worst kind of smut. You will be ridiculed as a purveyor of filth and mocked in the streets as your career circles the drain.

— So be it. How about some cowslip wine?

— Thought you’d never ask. Ah, the noble cowslip. It’ll carpet these English fields as far as the eye can see for generations to come. You mark my words.

Mrs. Beeton’s Everyday Cookery

Also from this book: Apple Genius, All This And Rabbit Stew, Brain Cakes, "Gushing entrails bricht", Blackbird Pie, The Empire Bites Back

Mead

One day, after chasing about trying to kill small animals with a rock, a man sat down and sighed. He had chased game all week and none of the females were interested in having sexual relations with him because he smelled a bit ripe, and well, he hadn’t shaved. Ever. God took pity on him, and gave him an idea in the form of a bee.

The man followed the bee back to its hive, and hungry as he was — and a little stupid to boot — he plunged his hands into the hive, breaking it apart, and stuffed the broken combs oozing honey into his drinking gourd. It still had a little water in it. By the time he got back to his cave, darkness had fallen, so by the light of a fire, he picked out the waxy comb, and left the watery honey to rest against a rock.

In the night, some microscopic airborne yeasts that the man didn’t know existed because he couldn’t see them, fell into the mixture with the breeze. There, they found what they were looking for — a source of sugar — and began eating away like mad, turning the sweetness into alcohol in the process.

The man, upon waking, was so hungry he immediately set out with his rocks to try to kill something for breakfast, and was gone all day. He was so far from his cave, in fact, that he ended up sleeping around a fire he’d made to cook a small bird on. By the time he got back to his cave, the honey and water and yeast had been sitting there, fermenting for days. A scum had formed on the top. He drew this off in disgust, and because he was thirsty, he took a sip.

And another. And another. He sat down. He felt, for the first time in his life, a little giddy, a little warm. An overwhelming feeling of goodwill came over him. He felt like singing. He stood and sang out a song of what it felt like to be a man with a bird in his stomach. It wasn’t good singing, to be sure, but he didn’t care. He was drunk. He had made mead: he felt he knew the secret to life. He was certain women would find him irresistible.

Drawn by the noise, a crone approached. The man saw an angel, a woman in her lush prime, rather than the bedraggled hag before him. He was so confident and happy, he offered her a taste of this sweet nectar that had given him such joy. Curious, she took a swig. Soon enough, she had discarded her filthy animal skins and was dancing naked around his fire. This made the man want to have sexual relations with her. One thing led to another and before long, both were sleeping peacefully, mouths agape, under the stars.

God was pleased with the way man had followed his instincts, but also knew too much of a good thing was … too much of a good thing. So he made the next day dawn with a brilliant sun that struck like daggers into the couple’s eyes, waking them rudely from their slumber. Their heads felt like boulders, like crushed eggshells. They took one look at each other and recoiled, aghast. What had they done? Where did that handsome hunk go? What happened to that babe from the night before?

A hungover Neanderthal and a wizened crone, they both grunted as they gathered their paltry things to hide their modesty. As she retreated, bent and hobbling, the man held his hand up to his ear, eyes squinted tight against the rude daylight that assaulted them, thumb and pinkie stuck out, and croaked, so quietly his words were drowned out by the swish of grass and the hum of bees, “So we’re on for next Saturday, right?”

But she did not turn around. She was already pregnant, the honey having worked its magic buzzing away deep within her. Truth be told, she felt a little sick.

Cooks and Confectioner’s Dictionary, John Nott, 1723

Also from this book: Blood Pudding, Tits, Sugared Plums (Ouch), Scurvy, Scourge Of The Seas, Quackery, Gastropub / Gastropig: Eating High on the Hog, Take Your Lumps, Pigeon à la Française, This Little Piggy...

Hop to it, Barkeep!

The smell of a new book, especially expensive coffee table books, can be divine — a heady mix of printing ink and paper. Old books, on the other hand, can  immediately bring to mind the attic or garage in which they were stored, their pages quietly soaking up the aroma of the passage of time itself: a distinctive musk of damp, dust and mildew.

While the new book smell is delightful, it’s the old book smell that evokes the strongest memories. If you want to recall the daring summer of your 13^th year when you discovered that stack of ancient National Geographics on the summer cottage shelf behind the board games, and pored over the risqué photographs of naked people and gawped at the old fashioned ads, then that smell will bring it all fondly back, along with a discomforting sense of arousal.

On the other hand, the two-volume set comprised of Playboy’s Host and Bar Book and Gourmet recipe guide from 1971 smells just exactly how one would imagine the Playboy Club to smell on Monday morning: reeking of stale cigarette smoke. If you ever secretly wanted to be a Bunny, in bobble tail and fishnets — or you longed to slink about in evening wear, jewels and a bouffant, or a white turtleneck and velvet sport coat sipping on cocktails with Heff in the hope of getting laid, then this book will not make you whimsically tumescent; it will put you right off.

In the epic battle for olfactory dominance, Rive Gauche and Aramis have sadly lost to Dunhill and Silk Cut.

Playboy Cooler

1 ¼ oz golden Jamaican rum

1 ¼ oz Jamaican coffee liqueur

3oz pineapple juice

2 teaspoons lemon juice

Cola drink

1 slice pineapple

Shake rum, coffee liqueur, pineapple juice and lemon juice well with ice. Strain into pre-chilled tall 14oz glasses. Add ice to fill glass to in inch from the top. Add cola. garnish with pineapple slice. Serve with long straw, as at the London Playboy Club.

Playboy’s Host & Bar Book, Thomas Mario, A Playboy Press Book, 1971